Tough Opponent

My mother-in-law told me that since her husband passed away, she has a lot more free time on her hands. The nights are the worst, because she doesn’t like watching TV, so she has to try to find other things to do. But since she lives alone, they have to be solo activities.

So, one night, she decided to play chess…against herself. I asked her if she had won, and she excitedly told that she had, but she said it was a tough match. It was almost as if the other one knew exactly what she was going to do. She would be contemplating moving her knight to this square, when suddenly she realized that the other one would take it with her bishop. The game took over two hours, because she was agonizing about every move and how to outsmart herself!

Squiggly Sidewalk

Near my house is a sidewalk that squiggles back and forth along the road. This might not seem so odd, except it only does it for about 25 feet. The rest of the sidewalk in both directions is perfectly straight. One might ask if it’s bending around something like a tree or sewer access. It is not. There is nothing to bend around. It just squiggles for no reason.

As I walk along it, I imagine the road worker who was cutting the path for it, driving his machine and drinking a beer. The path is straight, and he keeps drinking and drinking and drinking. And slowly the machine starts to swerve back and forth, as he struggles to stay going in a straight line…until he falls off the machine completely. The road crew drags him off to the side to sleep it off, and someone else hops on the machine and finishes the path for the sidewalk. The rest of the crew looks at the now squiggly path right in the middle of their straight sidewalk, shrugs, and fills it with concrete anyway. It beats having to cut it again. Besides the grass is already messed up.

19 Crimes

I opened a bottle of red wine tonight to have a glass with dinner. I had been attempting to try this bottle of wine for years now, ever since I gifted it to myself for Christmas. It’s called “19 Crimes,” and frankly I just liked the label. The label talks about how it’s based on convict wine made in Australia in the 1800s, but there’s no information about how the wine actually tastes like you see on many labels. So, I had no idea if it was sweet or dry, fruity or nutty, or anything else. It was like wine roulette!

My spousal unit and mother-in-law decided to give it a try as well. My mother-in-law took one sip, and her face twisted up in an almost pained expression. One of her eyes closed in a squint, her lips were pursed, and her head involuntarily cocked to one side. I laughed because it was the exact same reaction I had had when I took my first sip. The wine was very dry and smoky-flavored. I’d almost describe it as rough and strong, a very bold wine and not initially to my liking.

So, I took another sip to see if maybe it got better with each taste. It did not. My face contorted into the exact same expression, and I sarcastically said in a low, husky voice, “Very smooth…I can really feel my throat burning all the way down…good stuff.” To which my mother-in-law and spousal unit busted out laughing.

I downed two glasses, partly because I didn’t want to waste the money I had spent on it and partly because I was enjoying the dizzy, spinning feeling that I had gotten after the first glass. Of course that same feeling made it a little difficult to walk back across the kitchen to the bottle, and I had to make a wide left turn around the counter.

Driving in the Middle

My mother-in-law lives in Greece, but she’s originally from the island of Cyprus. She still has ties to the island, and she goes back to visit quite often. She was telling me that in Greece they drive on the left side of the car, like they do in the United States, but in Cyprus they drive on the right side of the car, like they do in the United Kingdom. My mother-in-law said that she has no issues switching back and forth when she goes from one country to another. She said the important thing to remember is to keep the driver in the middle of the road. I replied that if she drives in the middle of the road, then of course it doesn’t really matter. She doesn’t have to worry about the oncoming cars passing on the left or right, because they’re swerving to avoid her. The only thing that really changes is the steering wheel!

Bucket List

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about my own mortality and the shortness of our existence. I realize how fleeting time is and how we shouldn’t wait to experience life. So, I decided to make a bucket list of things I want to do before I die. Sadly, I only had four things on it. But it was a start.

Today, we went to some friends house for a play date. It was the first time we’d been to their house, and we were surprised to find out that they had a pond behind their house with ducks. Apparently, when they moved in, there weren’t any ducks in the area, and the woman’s mother had decided that they needed some. So, she went to a duck farm (I didn’t even know that they had such a thing) and adopted some large black and white ducks. They had thrived on their little pond, mostly because the woman’s mother had taken to feeding them every day, and now there were twice as many as they’d started with.

So, we got a scoop of food and knelt down to wait for the flock to arrive. And arrive they did. Within moments, ducks were flying and waddling toward us. They were so calm that they’d eat right out of your hand. And while they ate, they’d let you pet them.

Now, I have never had an urge to pet a duck before, but once I realized it was an option, it was all I wanted to do. So, I fed them and pet them. I…touched…a…duck! I immediately pulled out my bucket list, added “touch a duck” to it, and checked it off! Next up, take a picture with a quokka.

Carstrophobia

I realized that I really don’t like being pinned in between cars with no way to go. Imagine you’re going down the freeway in the far left lane. There’s a car ahead of you and a semi-truck ahead of him. To your right is another semi-truck, which you thought you were going to pass by getting in this lane. And behind you is another car, trying to pass the same semi-truck, who everyone assumes is actually part of your car because he’s driving too close for anyone to see any space between you.

You’re pinned in and stuck. The semi-truck ahead of you, which seemed so promising a few minutes before when he jerked over into this lane, forcing the car in front of you to slam on his brakes, is now driving the exact same speed as the semi-truck beside you. Now, he could have stayed behind the semi-truck to your right and driven this same speed, but he chose to take his show into the left lane and slow it down instead. He can pull over, but he won’t. The car in front of you could probably pull over too, but it’s a tight fit, so he’s playing it safe. Either the guy in front of you will get bold and finally pull over, only for the semi-truck in front on him to decide to do the same at that exact moment, or you’ll have to slow down and risk greeting the guy behind you when he slides up into your passenger seat. So, you wait…and wait…and wait.

I call the feeling in this moment “carstrophobia.” It’s a fear of being confined in a tight space in your car, and it gives me a lot of anxiety. I want out. I want freedom. I want to see open freeway ahead of me. It’s usually at this moment that I’ll execute my best vehicular maneuvers, like sliding under a semi-truck or using the emergency brake to execute a perfect spin onto the shoulder and around behind the car to my rear. Once free, I’ll gun it to get away. I’ll swim free of the pod and go rogue. I don’t care if I get eaten by a whale, because I’m a krill moving up the food chain! The vastness of the ocean doesn’t scare me. Carstrophobia does!

The License Plate Game

When I’m driving, I like to play a license plate game with myself to pass the time and challenge my mind. I used to do something similar when I was a kid on vacations with my dad, except those were usually finding plates from all 50 states. Success in my game is based on who has the most extensive vocabulary combined with the best imagination.

License plates in Texas usually are made up of 3 letters followed by 4 numbers. So, the idea of the game is to spot a random license plate on the road and to think of the longest word you can that encompasses those 3 letters in that exact order. The word can contain other letters before, in between, or after as well. The participant who comes up with the longest word, spelled correctly, wins that round. (There’s also a Wordscape variation where participants get extra points for each word they can generate with the same letters.)

So, for example, the car that just drove by me had MTG on their license plate. Someone might come up with “meeting” for 7 letters. But someone else might come up with “meetings” for 8 letters. While someone else might come up with “mitigating” for 10 letters.

I imagine one day playing this game with my son on trips to help fuel a love for words and to increase his vocabulary. Then again, my mom thinks it’s a pretty nerdy game, so maybe it will be too uncool for my son. All I know is that I’m currently undefeated in the game. I expect to still make a pretty good run at the title even after I get someone else to play with me!

Siri Glitch

I like to use Siri a lot to do things for me, especially when I’m driving. Today, I was using her to take a note for me, so I wouldn’t forget it by the time I could pull over and jot it down. When she’s done taking the note, she reads it back to you. Only this time, something went wrong. Siri got about halfway through the note and stopped. She had made a mistake reading the note and realized it. So, she said, “Nope…it says…” and then she started over again and reread the entire note, this time the correct way.

I was so shocked by this, and I wasn’t exactly sure that I’d heard it correctly. But I have been able to recreate it. I started to wonder if Apple coded this “feature” on purpose to make the experience more human and relatable.